# Alford Lee Cunningham v. Russell Jones, Jailer

> Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit · December 6, 1977 · 567 F.2d 653

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9464408

## Case

- **Full name:** Alford Lee CUNNINGHAM, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Russell JONES, Jailer, Et Al., Defendants-Appellees
- **Court:** Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
- **Decided:** December 6, 1977
- **Citations:** 567 F.2d 653; 1977 U.S. App. LEXIS 5743
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Peck
- **Judges:** Edwards, Peck, Engel
- **Cited by:** 123 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9464408

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- noting that “a complaint about the preparation or quality of prison food . . . would generally be far removed from Eighth Amendment concerns”
- holding that the deprivation of two out of three meals can support an Eighth Amendment claim when there is no evidence that the one meal served was nutritionally adequate
- finding that 27 the Eighth Amendment requires only that prisoners receive food adequate to maintain health; it need not be tasty or aesthetically pleasing
- holding that prison food must be adequate for a prisoner to “maintain normal health”

## Opinion text

PECK, Circuit Judge
concurring.
I concur in the majority opinion in this case, in which the record clearly establishes that having established a prima facie case the plaintiff-appellant could not procure and offer further essential evidence which was readily available to the defendant-ap-pellee, thereby justifying a shifting of the burden of proof. I would fall short of holding, however, as the majority opinion appears to hold, that the burden of proof automatically shifts as a matter of law on the basis of judicial notice of circumstances pertaining to the essential evidence, e. g., the caloric content of a given diet. It seems to me that such a shift should be predicated upon a showing that the plaintiff has made some attempt to obtain the evidence without success, rather than upon judicial notice of that circumstance.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9464408. Public record. Not legal advice.